David Jull (Fadden, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My question is addressed to the Minister for Workforce Participation. With Australia’s unemployment rates at 30-year lows, what are the latest performance figures for Australian government employment services, particularly in assisting the long-term unemployed?

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party, Minister for Workforce Participation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for Fadden for his question. It is a most important question for the economy and for all Australians who expect a fair go. The member for Grayndler a little while ago said in a press release:

Persistent high levels of long-term unemployment are indisputable proof that the Howard Government’s Job Network is failing to place the unemployed into jobs.

This was amazing. This was followed up with an ABC Adelaide radio interview, where the journalist asked the member for Grayndler:

“So you will take back, you will do away with the privatised network and you will bring all of these functions back into government if elected?”

The member for Grayndler snapped back:

No, certainly not.

Of course, the member for Grayndler understood that the Job Network is an extraordinarily successful program. The latest figures show that the Job Network has delivered record-breaking numbers of job outcomes, especially for the long-term unemployed.

In the last 12 months, Job Network has helped nearly 640,000 Australians, previously welfare dependent, into a real job. Nearly 47,000 of those jobs were for single parents, and that is a 57 per cent increase on the previous 12 months. We have also placed 11,000 people with a disability into employment—that is a new annual record. Almost 45,000 Indigenous Australians were found work. Mr Speaker, you know our Indigenous Australians have had some of the greatest difficulty finding jobs in previous generations. Most importantly, long-term unemployment has fallen by over 70 per cent since 1993. That is 230,000 fewer people—fewer families—who have been locked into long-term unemployment.

You need to compare these statistics to when long-term unemployment actually peaked at 330,000 in May 1993. Yes, it is a significant date: it was when the Leader of the Opposition was employment minister. That is when long-term unemployment peaked, very tragically, for the Australian people. What did the Leader of the Opposition, then the employment minister, say about this problem? He said that long-term unemployment was ‘an almost intractable problem’ and ‘the guts of the problem is going to be there with us and it is growing’.

Can you imagine what the long-term unemployed thought when they heard that dismissal?

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They would have been depressed.

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party, Minister for Workforce Participation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

They would have been depressed. They would have felt, in fact, written off and completely left to their own devices.

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ignored.

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party, Minister for Workforce Participation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ignored. Put simply, Labor ran up the white flag and left them stranded. Remember, it was the minister for employment—the current Leader of the Opposition—who also dismissed unemployed 55-year-olds and said, ‘Put them on the old age pension.’ What a disgrace! So Labor had no plan to help the unemployed then; they have no policy now. The John Howard government has revolutionised the way we help the unemployed into work.

Honourable Members:

Honourable members interjecting—

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The level of interjection is far too high!

Sharman Stone (Murray, Liberal Party, Minister for Workforce Participation) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We are meeting the challenges of an ageing population and a booming economy, and we are delivering a better life to those Labor simply consigned to the scrap heap.

John Howard (Bennelong, Liberal Party, Prime Minister) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I ask that further questions be placed on the Notice Paper.

Tony Abbott (Warringah, Liberal Party, Leader of the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, I rise on a point of order. I understand that, in the member for Griffith’s final question today, he put it to the House that the Prime Minister had deliberately lied. This is clearly unparliamentary and I believe that he should be asked to withdraw and to apologise.

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I did not catch that comment, but, if the member for Griffith did say that, he should withdraw it.

Anthony Albanese (Grayndler, Australian Labor Party, Deputy Manager of Opposition Business in the House) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I wish to speak to the point of order, Mr Speaker. You have ruled on a number of occasions, when we have raised points of order about comments being out of order on that side of the chamber, that those points of order have to be raised at the time the comments were made. If the Leader of the House—

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Grayndler will resume his seat! That was not the point raised by the Leader of the House. I ask the member for Griffith: if he made that statement, he should withdraw it.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and International Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Speaker, the reason I used the language is that it was true. If it gives offence—

Government Members:

Government members interjecting—

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and International Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You know it’s true!

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Griffith will withdraw!

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and International Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If it assists the House, I withdraw.

David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Griffith will withdraw without reservation.

Kevin Rudd (Griffith, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and International Security) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw.